After years of rhetoric and legal implications, a recent report has discovered that online piracy has not negatively impacted the music industry. In fact, as the people at The London School of Economics and Political Science have found, the act of file-sharing an artist’s material can in fact be beneficial to their sales and the industry in general.

Having examined the facts and figures with a fine tooth comb, scholars at the institution say that, despite the obvious decline in revenue from physical unit sales, the music industry has experienced an overall growth in profit. This is largely due to more emphasis being place on financial gain in other spheres of the industry including publishing, digital presence and an influx of demand for live performances.

As it turns out, those who illegally download music are more inclined to funnel their cash back into the music industry machine in other ways, such as concert tickets and merch, whereas those who purchase the music tend to leave it at that.

The success of streaming services such as SoundCloud and YouTube was also originally seen as being to the detriment of the music industry however, in terms of promotional currency, these services have proven to have an immeasurable affect.

Those who undertook the research did so in an attempt to convince the UK government to reconsider their attitude towards copyright. As well as the numbers and figures, the study also includes opinions of music industry lobbyists. Speaking of the report, scholar Bart Cammaerts explained:

“Contrary to the industry claims, the music industry is not in terminal decline, but still holding ground and showing healthy profits. Revenues from digital sales, subscription services, streaming and live performances compensate for the decline in revenues from the sale of CDs or records.”